6 INTRODUCTION. 



Southward of Oxford, broad alluvial meadows, rich in verdure 

 in summer, and damp and liable to floods in winter, backed in 

 places by wooded slopes, border the Isis as far as a little below 

 the spot where it receives the waters of the Thame ; here the 

 Chiltern range begins to affect the country. 



In view of the recent Act restricting shooting on the river, 

 it is to be hoped that the Coots, Moorhens, Dabchicks, Wild- 

 ducks, etc., may again increase on the Thames. Formerly they 

 were decimated by the numerous ' pot-hunters ' who came up 

 the river in boats, shooting at every bird they saw. 



Across the narrow part of the county, east of the Thame 

 valley, and following the trend of it in a north-easterly 

 direction, a belt of more or less flat land lies at the foot of the 

 chalk-hills. 



The southern division includes, roughly speaking, that part 

 of the county lying south-east of a line drawn from the 

 Thames at North Stoke north-eastwards to Chinnor. In this 

 district a narrow border of meadow lies in places between the 

 river and the Chiltern range of chalk-hills, but g-enerally the 

 arable fields of the open wold slope g'cntly dow^i to the river^s 

 banks ; here and there the slope is steeper and wooded. The 

 Chiltern Hills are partly open sheep-down, dotted over with 

 juniper bushes, on which here and there the plough has made 

 inroads on the shallow soil, and partly covered with beech 

 wood interspersed in parts with the oak and white beam, and 

 with plantations of conifers ; here and there on the top of the 

 hills are patches of rough, broken ground, partly clothed with 

 ling, juniper, etc. Here the local Woodlark finds a home, and 

 the soil is warm enough to encourage the Cirl Bunting; 

 while the Dotterel has not yet ceased to visit some of the 

 hills, and the Stone Curlew still breeds sparingly in at least 

 one locality. The open chalk-downs, with their scattered 

 juniper bushes are of course favourable to the Stonechat, 

 Whinchat, and Wheatear. 



Scattered over the county, here aud there, are little iso- 

 lated, and often decreasing, tracts of heathy land ; remnants 

 of the wide-stretching heaths once covering a considerable 

 portion of the county. Such exist at Cottisford, Hand- 



